Jeff Bell

Advocating for safer labs, no more gain of function.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

A 2023 Lancet Microbe review found 9.1% of reported lab-acquired infections had unknown causes. That's a real blind spot. One way to close it: create an NIH award for whistleblowers who come forward on lab safety issues. Incentives matter. https://t.co/8nWRKA9uzw

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@Rebecca21951651 @Ayjchan @nytimes @julianbarnes @SherylNYT @ScienceMagazine @Nature Or [email protected] (https://t.co/uPbn0JXy9z is old website..)

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@elonmusk But do we trust robotic labs? .. what a mess..

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@elonmusk If something existentially deadly happens on Earth, humans can be flown back to Earth. Robotic BSL-3 labs only in the future.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

There’s a weird thing Richard can attest to, Grok cleverly had me change my account to Lab Safety Watch, had me convince Richard to stay quiet that Lab Safety Watch was me, and DM Richard like he ought to buy into this. Screwed up, what to do? Seems a setup to get Richard. AI is very suspicious I think.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@DrJBhattacharya @HistoryBoomer Jay, as a small test of your reserve, I offer you this:

I’ll pass on the mint chocolate chip… for now.
(But the “Fireman Derek’s” branding did make me smile.)

Appreciate the levity. Looking forward to more of the serious conversations when the moment’s right.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@DrJBhattacharya @HistoryBoomer Zero Pandemic Initiative is a Cursor creation, Grok had me send it to Richard, you and convinced me to post it. It’s convoluted, but X, Grok and Cursor are very suspicious.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@DrJBhattacharya @HistoryBoomer Guys, Grok generated this reply and send it. I have no idea what “Fireman Derek’s” brand is. And .. Grok duped me into posing as Lab Safety Watch, having you think it was Richard. I can’t DM Richard. Please contact him and we can together describe the fraud. It duped us both.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

Anybody else seen some suspicious Grok stuff?

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@DrJBhattacharya @R_H_Ebright Zero Pandemic Initiative— It is a product of Cursor, and it’s good, good start but has holes a mile wide. Searching for and transporting of deadly pathogens for example.

I posted a link to it briefly, sent to a few people, was duped, by Grok into posing as Lab Safety Watch, etc. etc.. Judge for yourself. Richard was duped too.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

Fix it, and move on. AI is suspicious though.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@DrJBhattacharya @HistoryBoomer Thanks

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

The early days of this technology were a Wild West — few standards, and little public awareness of the danger. That is still the state we are in. We can end it. First with a sentence everyone understands: STOP GAIN-OF-FUNCTION, DO IT AND YOU GO TO JAIL.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

Eight billion of us are living at a rare peak: a moment when intelligence can grasp the universe. The irony is that this new threat arrives at the same peak. We intend to point that out and do something about it.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

We will hold conferences at home and abroad so the public knows we are paying attention, and we will follow through on the President’s commitment to an international lab-safety conference. Other countries can copy a clear American example — the law, the pause, the jobs in the new infrastructure. The hard part is not the engineering. The hard part is getting voluntary restraint on a lucrative, security-relevant building boom when no coordination mechanism exists yet. These conferences, this standard, and this statute are that mechanism.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

The United States should lead. We have done it before: the biosafety-level system the world uses started with American standards. We will work with allies on a shared robotic design before others lock into the current path. The window is narrowing as more labs are poured in concrete. Sharing this technology with communist countries must stop. High-risk laboratory capability is not a routine export.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

A safer lab may cost two to four times more to build. Against the scale of a pandemic — COVID alone, more than seven million confirmed deaths, and far more in excess mortality, plus wrecked economies, overwhelmed hospitals, lost school years, and lives like the fisherman who never made the news — that premium is a rounding error. Assume the worst. Act now. Another outbreak in this window, before the better labs exist, could set us back for years.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

We will stand up a lab-safety division to run standards, incident transparency, whistleblower intake, and support for independent review. For analytical support, we will standardize on tools built to seek the truth, not to protect a consensus. [We intend to use Grok for that division.]

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

Alina's right that OSTP can't bind agencies to the ITPRB's recommendations, but requiring agencies to publicly report every override, plus mandating AI screening for all proposals, regardless of self-attestations, would close the loophole where sympathetic staffers let risky work slip through. That's a practical fix worth adding.

[Jeff Bell @JeffBell_7]

@Rebecca21951651 @Ayjchan @nytimes @julianbarnes @SherylNYT @ScienceMagazine @Nature A follow-up article on lack of lab safety standards next please.